Autistic children have an excessive amount of synapses, or brain connections between neurons, which doesn’t alter as it should with age, US scientists have revealed. This could help develop a drug normalizing their number even after diagnosis.

“Chunking is a critical element of the learning process and explains how we can learn and retain increasingly complex information.”
Via EDTC@UTB

Tom Perran's insight:

This article explains how chunking works and how to apply it in the classroom. Is based on the principle that it's easier to remember small sets of information and a large set. For instance, is it easier to remember 3054269547 or 305–4 26–9547?

"How Sugar Affects the Brain http://bit.ly/1m7zQU3 is a TED-Ed lesson that I stumbled upon this evening while looking for a YouTube video about making sugar glazes (by the way, this is the one I was looking for). In the TED-Ed lesson students learn why sugary foods and beverages can become addictive and how the human body processes sugar."

Recent research suggests that the difficulties dyslexia creates with reading may not be hard-wired. Instead, experience may play a big role in exacerbating reading problems and, potentially, in easing them.

"Have you ever considered letting your students listen to hardcore punk while they take their mid-term exam? Decided to do away with Power Point presentations during your lectures? Urged your students to memorize more in order to remember more? If the answer is no, you may want to rethink your notions of psychology and its place in the learning environment. Here are 35 critical thinking strategies, straight from the mind of Sigmund Freud." | by Sara Briggs
Via Todd Reimer

Tom Perran's insight:

Good strategies to incorporate when planning instruction. (some we already use!)

Some of these are excellent memory methods, which people learn automatically from a very young age. One way to help older learners is to try to get them back to that exciting trial and error style that they had as young children.

Watch babies aged a year plus and see how they are fascinated by simple activities such as picking up a pencil and walking backwards and forwards to drop it at a certain spot, then walking around a table and carrying out the same action again and again. But watch carefully, the spot the pencil has been placed is usually near something else, sometimes a larger object.

One of the things we stop doing as we get older is to enjoy repeating things from different perspectives: that is learning with stress. If students looked at what they were learning as something that enhanced their understanding rather than just for passing exams, learning would be memorable and more enjoyable. You do not need a teacher to' teach' you this. Most of the psychology-based strategies are inherent.

So parents start children as soon as they start crawling; leave books, small toys and a variety of different toys around and watch how they learn. NOT EVERYTHING GOES INTO THEIR MOUTHS!!

Elizabeth Borneman explores how cartography and cartographic projections help and hinder our perception of the world."How do you think the world (starting with our perceptions) could change if the map looked differently? What if Australia was on top and the hemispheres switched? By changing how we look at a map we truly can begin to explore and change our assumptions about the world we live in."Geography doesn’t just teach us about the Earth; it provides ways for thinking about the Earth that shapes how we see the world. Maps do the same; they represent a version of reality and that influences how we think about places. Tags: mapping, perspective.
Via Seth Dixon

Using our keyboards saves us lots of precious time, but writing by hand has lots of benefits.

Researchers have shown that children who know how to write by hand learn to read faster. They are also better at retaining information and coming up with new ideas.

“When we write, a unique neural circuit is automatically activated. There is a core recognition of the gesture in the written word, a sort of recognition by mental simulation in your brain,” Stanislas Dehaene, a psychologist at the Collège de France in Paris, told The New York Times.

A study conducted at Indiana University, in the US, reported that when children write by hand three areas of the brain are activated—the left fusiform gyrus, the inferior frontal gyrus and the posterior parietal cortex. These are the same areas that are set in motion when adults read and write. Kids who typed or just traced letters didn’t show any activation in these areas.

“ Kindness Is Something Students Learn By Feeling It by Lisa Currie, Ripple Kindness Project Most people have heard the phrase ‘random acts of kindness’, which refers to a selfless act of giving resulting in the happiness...”
Via Dean J. Fusto

“ How often do you check a screen to see what's going on in the news? It's probably a lot more often than you think. Consider your Twitter feed. Consider your Facebook timeline. Consider how many text message alerts you are...”
Via Mat Loup

I get excited with research and the implications of research. I value evidence and application over theory and anecdotal information. Validity. The problem will always be in how the research is interpreted and translated/fitted from one setting (the lab) to the classroom (practical use). Neuroscience is relatively new. There is nothing wrong with testing these ideas for use in the classroom though. However, the "Usable classroom translations" are sometimes close in "proximity" to what we educators already believe (indicating perhaps a confirmation bias), or the translations are huge leaps from the research takeaway (the conclusion?). For example, the author references this: "Brain Target 4: Teaching for MasteryNeuroscience behind it: In order for information to be retained it must make its way from short-term to long-term memory.Usable classroom translation: Use the arts as a tool to enhance and reinforce learning goals (Rinne, Gregory, Yarmolinskaya, and Hardiman, 2011)". This doesn't fit with my understanding of evidence. I need a few more connections between the "dots" of research conclusion with the implicated classroom practice.

“ Understanding the basics of the Cognitive Load Theory and applying them to your instructional design is an absolute must, particularly if you want your learners to get the most out of the eLearning course you are creating. This guide will offer you a detailed look at Cognitive Load Theory, including how it can be applied in learning settings. Check the Cognitive Load Theory and Instructional Design article and presentation to find more.”
Via mjonesED

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